Small Countries... (Call for articles)

Women's Writings in the Literatures of Small Countries in the 19th Century (working title)

Editors:

• Katja Mihurko Poniž (University of Nova Gorica),
  
• Henriette Partzsch (University of St Andrews).
  
  

In the context of of the COST Action Women Writers In History: Toward a New Understanding of European Literary Culture a volume about women's writing in the literatures of small countries in the 19th century will be published. The aim of the aforementioned Action is to lay the groundwork for a new history of European women’s participation in the literary field of the centuries before 1900. Particular attention is paid to women’s participation in transnational cultural dynamics and to the overlooked role of “smaller”, less internationally known literatures within the larger European context.

In September 2010 an international symposium titled “Women’s Authorship and Literatures of Small Countries in the 19th Century” was organized in Ljubljana. The participants from 17 countries investigated the role and place of women authors within “smaller” cultures, and their connections with their female counterparts in “larger”, dominating cultures. Now the programme committee of the symposium decided to prepare the volume on the women writers in the literatures of small countries.

The COST Action Women Writers In History is asking for the contributions from the speakers and other scholars working on the topics of the volume. Written culture and literature played a particularly important role in the aforementioned countries as they were often considered constitutive elements in the shaping of national consciousness and identity under foreign domination. Similar emphasis on literature was common to all stateless nations in the German-speaking Austrian, Russian, and Ottoman Empires. But even without being dominated, smaller countries occupied a particular position in literary geography as they were to a large extent on the receiving end of international literary exchanges. The question of how and in what manner this situation was reflected in the works of women writers was discussed at the symposium. The debate during the symposium and the results revealed, next to differences between countries such as Finland, Slovenia and the Netherlands, also interesting similarities in the development of women's authorship in the countries explored. It provoked interest in further research, especially with respect to their development in those countries which were not presented at the symposium.

We plan a volume in which each of the articles will contain a short presentation of the national literature concerned, but will then discuss specific questions concerning reception. The editors encourage research on the reception of women writers and the contacts between them and contemporaries from other countries. Starting points will be provided by answers to the following questions:

• Which women writers from "dominating" literatures are received in small countries?
  
• Which women from small countries are received in "dominating" literatures?
  
• Which women from small countries are received in other small countries?
  
• Which types of source materials are interesting for the reception of women writers in the small countries?
  
• How to interpret the role of women in cultural mediation?
  
  

In answering these questions the WomenWriters database http://www.databasewomenwriters.nl/ can be used as a tool and as the basis for the study of mechanisms of exchange, which go further than a case study, but on the contrary:

• should have a comparative/relational dimension (e.g. differences/similarities of reception)
  
• should have a quantitative dimension (how visible is the exchange?)
  
• should situate the studied data in the literary system of the receiving language area, and its connection to the European literary space,
  
• should reflect on the effects produced by gender (or the lack of it).
  
  

Literary areas of interest would be:

• literatures written in languages without a state/minority languages
  
• literatures written in a language that is mostly identified with a "small" state in Europe (e.g. Netherlands)
  
• literatures in (one of) the language(s) of a small country that shares its national language(s) with "dominating" countries (e.g. Switzerland).
  
  

We want this volume to contribute to discussions within the Action, therefore we invite you to send the articles by 31 January 2012. Each article should have a total of max. 6000 words.
Discussions are going on with several international publishers.

For information about the COST Action: www.womenwriters.nl.

Please send the articles to:

• katja.mihurko-poniz@guest.arnes.si
  
• hamp2@st-andrews.ac.uk
  
  

Please don't hesitate to contact the editors if you want to discuss your ideas.

SvD, December 2011

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• Conferences and activities > COST meetings > Ljubljana World Book Capital > Publication